Managing the internal image
Much of the popular focus on marketing concerns what happens outside the organisation. In fact, it is often what happens within the organisation that has most effect on the corporate image and reputation. Employees go home after work and mix with their families and friends. Their word of mouth carries a great deal more weight than any corporate advertising, and yet employees frequently find it hard to say anything positive about their employers.
In fact work is about much more than merely coming home with a pay cheque. Many people base their identities on their work roles and fulfil social needs through their work. Others meet intellectual needs or find work challenging and interesting. Still others have ambitions that can only be met through being part of an organisation. For these people, a job which pays well but does not meet their other needs is entirely inadequate, and they are likely to seek employment elsewhere.
This theme is about how you can establish a good corporate image among employees, and how you can use public relations and internal marketing to create a corporate culture and manage change within an organisation. The advantages of doing this are that morale tends to rise, staff turnover tends to fall and efficiency tends to improve, but in exchange for this some effort needs to be made and there are costs attached.
In this theme you will:
Consider why it is important to manage the internal image
Explore techniques for managing the internal image
Assess the role effectiveness of the house journal in your organisation
Consider how internal marketing can be used to support the change process in organisations.
Internal versus external marketing
Internal marketing and external marketing have some notable differences, as shown in Table 4.1.
Internal marketing |
External marketing |
Focuses primarily on production of goods and services |
Focuses primarily on consumption of goods and services |
Uses media which are only available to a small group |
Uses publicly available media |
Usually directs effort towards individuals whose identities are known in detail |
Usually directs effort towards individuals whose identities are unknown |
Seeks to generate more profit by reducing costs |
Seeks to generate more profit by increasing revenues or profit margin per unit |
Seeks to increase shareholder value by improving employee values |
Seeks to increase shareholder value by improving brand values |
Improves the organisation's survival chances by retaining and nurturing top-grade employees |
Improves the organisation's survival chances by improving competitive position |
Table 4.1 Internal versus external marketing
Since marketing is concerned with the management of exchanges, it seems sensible to assume that internal marketing is about the management of internal exchanges – exchanges that happen within the organisation. These exchanges are numerous and may also be hierarchical. A possible hierarchy is as follows:
exchange of time for salary
exchange of loyalty for supportive management
exchange of effort for respect
exchange of commitment and ideas for information about the organisation's future direction.
Unlike most external marketing, the exchanges cannot always be expressly stated. While the exchange of time for salary (the basic exchange in all employment contracts) is expressly stated and is quantifiable, the other exchanges are harder to define. Having said that, the problem can still be analysed and ultimately solved.
In some cases, the exchange of money for time might be as far as either party wishes to take the relationship. This situation will only arise where employees perform low-grade manual tasks and have little contact with the organisation's customers. In all other cases, employee motivation and attitudes have considerable impact on the success of the organisation. Employees are important in two ways: firstly as stakeholders in the organisation, which means that their motivation and commitment is necessary for the organisation's success; and secondly as ambassadors for the organisation.
Creating pride in the organisation and in its work can be achieved by carrying out the tasks shown in Table 4.2. These factors were identified as a result of research carried out by Kanter (1985) over a five-year period.
Task |
Rationale and methods of achievement |
Encourage an atmosphere of pride |
Highlight the achievements of individuals, publicising these to others. Use innovative staff as agents of change |
Provide suitable vehicles for innovation |
Have communication channels that allow innovative ideas to be disseminated and acted on across organisational boundaries |
Improve lateral communication |
This will improve the flow of innovative Ideas. Encouraging joint project teams and interdepartmental social events, and exchanging people between departments, where possible, can facilitate this |
Cut down layers of hierarchy |
By devolving decision making down the hierarchy and by cutting out layers of management, employees can feel more in control of what is happening within the organisation |
Increase the available information regarding organisational plans and projects |
Reducing secrecy will ensure closer involvement of those who have to implement the plans, and may also lead to a reduction in mistakes caused through unrealistic planning – ground-floor staff are usually much closer to the problem than senior management |
Ensure that the leadership is aware of its limited perspective |
Running the organisation from the top is unlikely to be as effective as giving employees more control over events, provided of course that the employees are attuned to the organisation's objectives |
Table 4.2 Tasks for improving staff perception of the organisation Source: Adapted from Kanter (1985)
From the employee's perspective, the organisation needs to supply answers to these questions (D'Apris, 1987):
1 What's my job?
2 How am I doing?
3 Does anybody give a damn?
Once the organisation has answered these questions, the employee will want answers to these:
4 How are we doing?
5 How do we fit in to the whole?
6 How can I help?
The last of these questions is, of course, the one that the management of the organisation is most ready to answer. The task of answering all these questions is part of the remit of the internal PR systems of the organisation. The public relations people sometimes generate the tools used for this, though more often the personnel department of the organisation carries out the task. Typical internal PR tools are:
corporate intranets
internal newsletters
staff magazines
staff meetings.
Rowntree Mackintosh
Rowntree Mackintosh takes internal communications seriously. The company has a history of employee involvement going back to the days of its Quaker founders, but during the 1970s and 1980s management established a comprehensive employee communications system.
Within the company there is a team-briefing process that involves all employees in problem solving. The teams find solutions to problems within their own departments and pass these on to management for implementation. The company newspaper appears in five local editions each month, and employees each get an annual report of their own, in addition to the shareholders’ annual report. Twice a year employees are given a comprehensive briefing on the state of the business, and there is a profit-sharing scheme and quality circles that meet regularly to maintain (and improve on) standards. At every level and for every problem there is employee involvement – and it pays off.
Senior management report that this high level of involvement and trust has led to a greater level of understanding among the employees. This in turn has generated lower absenteeism and greater productivity, but this is the least of the results. Most importantly of all, it is virtually impossible to find a Rowntree Mackintosh employee who has a bad word to say about the company – and that is a rare thing in this day and age!
The Rowntree Mackintosh example shows that there is more to good employee relations than merely maintaining the company noticeboard and writing a newsletter. Real commitment of management to employee involvement is essential and has to go beyond mere communication of management decisions.
Managing the internal image
Objective
Use this activity to examine the internal image of the organisation. The purpose of the exercise is to identify the positive and negative aspects of the organisation from the employee's viewpoint, in particular looking at some of the key characteristics which employees regard as fundamental to their jobs. This should enable you to consider ways of improving the internal image and of improving morale by maintaining the positive aspects and minimising the negative aspects of the organisation's image.
Task
Ask a selection of colleagues to rate the organisation on the attributes shown in the table provided. Ask them to assign a score out of 10, with 10 as the highest rating.
Salary: fair pay |
Supportive management |
Respect in the workplace |
Information about the organisation's future |
What is the average score for the organisation on each attribute? |
|
What might be the effects of scoring tow on each one? |
|
What might be the effects of scoring high? |
|
Feedback
Sometimes people are more negative in their statements than they need to be. This is because it is sometimes part of the organisational culture to be negative: employees who refer to their employer as ‘this place’ are often making a political statement rather than expressing a true feeling.
Having said that, a consistently low score on one or other of the attributes will lead one to suspect that there is a problem. If the employer is offering an unattractive exchange, or offering little in exchange, the employees might feel entitled to reduce what they offer.
Low salaries mean a lowered propensity to continue the exchange. This might manifest itself as a higher staff turnover, as an increase in absenteeism or as a ‘we pretend to work and they pretend to pay us’ attitude.
Unsupportive management discourages loyalty. Loyalty works both ways, and staff who do not feel supported will seeks ways of protecting themselves rather than concentrating on the job in hand.
Respect is basic to human relationships. Although respect should be earned, it is advisable to begin by showing respect, even if this later turns out to be misplaced. Employees who do not feel respected are unlikely to make much effort.
Information about the organisation's future encourages employees to become involved in the process. This in turn encourages ideas and improves commitment to the long-term aims of the organisation.
Of course, these exchanges are tacit rather than overt: managers do not say ‘If you do this, I will do that’ as a regular way of managing staff. Nevertheless, the days when managers could simply tell staff what to do and expect automatic obedience are long gone.
The role of public relations in
the organisation
Public relations is often seen as an external activity forming the opinions of outsiders. In fact, it has a crucial role to play in developing the corporate culture.
Reading this article will help you to:
understand how PR activities can improve staff morale and retention
explore ways of improving internal PR
develop techniques for guiding the corporate culture.
Organisational needs
Organisations, just like people, have needs. Some of these needs are common to all organisations, and have different levels of importance according to the circumstances of the organisation or the particular stage in its development. A hierarchy of organisational needs was developed by Pearson (1980). Table 4.3 shows how PR can help in satisfying those needs.
Organisational need |
Requirements |
Typical PR activity |
Output |
Money, machines, manpower, materials |
Staff programmes to attract the right people |
Survival |
Cash flow, profits, share performance, Customers |
Publicity aimed at customers. Events publicising the organisation and its products |
Morale |
Employee job satisfaction |
Staff newsletters, morale-boosting activities, etc. |
Acceptability |
Approval by the external stakeholders – shareholders, government, customers, suppliers, society in general |
External PR, shareholder reports, lobbying of government departments and MPs, events for suppliers and customers, favourable press releases |
Leadership |
Having a respected position in the organisation's chosen field – this could be due to customer satisfaction, employee involvement, industry leadership in technology, or several of these |
Corporate image-building exercises, customer care activities, publicity about new products and technological advances, sponsorship of research in universities, sponsorship of the arts |
Table 4.3 The hierarchy of organisational needs
Pearson's hierarchy is useful as a concept but less useful as a practical guide because so many organisations vary the order in which these needs are met.
Sony Corporation
When Akio Morita (and others) founded the Sony Corporation just after the Second World War the directors decided that corporate unity and staff involvement in the running of the company were paramount.
At the time, due to post-war shortages, the company was having difficulty getting materials to work with and a factory from which to operate. Employees were relatively easy to find – the Japanese Army was gradually returning home, and many qualified electronics engineers were available. However, their morale was low, and often their physical condition and their personal lives were not in good shape. Morita (an ex-Navy engineer himself) arranged for the employees to have a company uniform so that the distinction between management and staff would be less obvious, and also to give the outside world a good impression of the company. There was also a less high-flown aspect to this apparently enlightened approach – many of the employees had only ragged clothes or the remnants of their army uniforms, so Morita was able to ensure loyalty because so many of his staff literally had nothing to wear other than the company uniform.
Sony employees felt confident that they were working with, rather than for, the corporation and co-operated wholeheartedly in getting the fledgling company off the ground. Other Japanese companies followed a similar approach to that of Sony, with a long-lasting effect on the culture of Japan. Staff turnover in Japan is a tiny fraction of what it is in Western countries, and companies such as Sony enjoy a worldwide reputation for good business ethics.
Source: Based on Morita (1987)
Internal communications media
House journal
House journals are printed information books or sheets that are made available to employees. Journals may be of any of the following types:
Magazine Containing feature articles and illustrations, magazines are relatively expensive to produce but have a professional, credible feel about them.
Newspaper These can be produced to resemble a tabloid newspaper, which makes them more accessible to some groups of employees. The contents consist of news articles about the organisation, with some feature articles.
Newsletter Common in small organisations, a newsletter will probably be A4 or foolscap size, and will contain brief items, usually without illustration. Newsletters are cheap and easy to produce, especially in small numbers.
Wall newspaper These look like posters and are displayed on walls. They are useful for brief communications about events or changes in organisational policies.
Electronic newsletter Internal e-mail systems offer great potential for disseminating newsletters. The medium is cheap to use, effective, and often increases the likelihood that the newsletter will be read. Furthermore, it is possible to tell who opened the newsletter and who deleted it without reading it – although, of course, opening it is not the same as reading it.
When planning a house journal, you need to consider the issues shown in Figure 4.1:
Readership Different groups of staff may have different needs, so it may be necessary to produce different journals for each. Research workers are likely to have different needs from truck drivers, for instance.
Quality The greater the number of copies, the lower the production cost per copy. If the number of employees is large, a better-quality journal can be produced; if the number is small, the organisation may need to produce newsletters or wall newspapers instead.
Frequency Frequent publication means that the journal is more likely to become part of the daily routine of staff. Some large organisations even publish such journals daily.
Policy The journal should be more than simply a propaganda device for senior management. It should fit in with an overall PR programme and should have a clear editorial policy to ensure the quality of its content.
Title The title should be characteristic of the organisation. Changing the title is difficult once it has become established, as with any brand name.
Printing process To an extent the printing process will affect the content, since simple, cheap printing processes cannot reproduce some illustrations. Cost will also affect the choice of process, as will the desire for a good-quality, credible journal.
Style and format Credibility is linked to the degree to which the journal resembles a commercial magazine. Style and format are part of the communication in the same way that packaging is part of a product.
Price Obviously the vast majority of house journals are free to staff, but it is feasible to make a charge if the journal is sufficiently interesting. There is no reason why a cover price should not be put on the journal in any case, even if it is free. This conveys to the staff that the journal is valuable and thus it is more likely to be read.
Advertisements Carrying advertising may be a useful way to reduce costs. If the circulation is sufficiently large, outside organisations might be prepared to place advertising – this is particularly true if the producer of the journal is a large organisation operating from a single location, since local shops, restaurants and entertainment venues might well wish to promote their products. Employees may well want to advertise items for sale or forthcoming social events and this also increases the readability of the journal.
Distribution Journals can be delivered by hand, by post to the employee's home address or from distribution points within the organisation (such as mail pigeonholes). The decision will be based on the frequency of publication, the location of employees and the type of journal involved. Distribution via e-mail is probably the quickest and cheapest method.
Figure 4.1 Issues to consider in designing a house journal
House journals are often edited independently of senior management to ensure that the focus is on the employees’ need for information rather than on the management's need to control or manipulate.
Websites
Many organisations now operate internal websites or intranets – aimed at employees. These sites cannot be accessed by outsiders and they fulfil the same function as the house journal. The main advantage is that the costs are greatly reduced compared with producing a house journal. The disadvantage is that employees are unlikely to access the site except during working hours and in some cases may not be able to access the site at all because the nature of their work does not involve using a computer.
Internal websites are most useful in organisations in which virtually every employees is provided with a computer and in which there is no problem about allowing employees to scan the website during working hours. Website design is a specialist area, but some rules have been developed: sites need to be simple to access and use; graphics should be kept simple to minimise download time; and, as far as possible, articles should fit onto one screen.
Internal briefings and open meetings
Some organisations give staff the opportunity to have access to senior management at open meetings or briefings. These briefings have the advantage of allowing senior management to gain direct access to grass-roots views from the workforce, as well as giving the workforce the chance to question senior managers about organisational policies.
The overall effect is to increase openness within the organisation and break down barriers. In general, employees work better if they understand why things are being done the way they are being done. This understanding also enables them to use their initiative better if the system breaks down for any reason.
House journals
Objective
Use this activity to assess your house journal. The objective here is to enable you to identify ways in which the journal might be improved, and in particular to help you identify ways in which the internal marketing of the organisation could be helped by better design of the house journal.
Task
Using the list of issues in Figure 4.1, analyse the house journal of your organisation. If your organisation does not have a house journal, you might be able to obtain one from a friend who works for a different organisation.
Use the table provided for your analysis.
Readership |
Printing process |
Quality |
Style and format |
Frequency |
Price |
Policy |
Advertisements |
Title |
Distribution |
What changes would you make to the factors you have identified in order to improve the effectiveness of the journal? What results would you hope to obtain from these changes?
Do you think your colleagues would make different changes?
Changes |
Results from change |
Colleagues’ changes? |
|
|
|
Feedback
Obviously the changes you might want to make are somewhat subjective, but In many cases the essential problem with a house journal lies in ensuring that the employees actually read it.
For this reason, you will probably have focused on the policy, distribution, style and format. You might expect an increase in readership to follow on from making changes in these areas.
Internal marketing and change management
During the 1990s and the early part of the 21st century, change management has been one of the main preoccupations of management thinking. This is due to a perception that we are living in times of rapid change, and therefore the ability to change the organisation in order to adapt to environmental changes is essential for survival. Whether or not this is true remains to be seen, but there is no doubt that change is unpopular among employees. Most people are suspicious of change, particularly when something as fundamental as their working life is involved, and a typical response to any proposed change is likely to be one of resistance. This is despite the fact that most changes are for the better, at least in the long run.
However, change is a constant feature of life and therefore systems need to be in place to manage a continuous process of change which never reaches a stable state. Some commentators have referred to this as ‘managing changing’ rather than ‘managing change’. Organisations with flat structures in which communication is quick and easy have less trouble adapting to change than organisations with hierarchical structures where communication takes a great deal of time and passes through several layers before it reaches the recipients. The key to using internal marketing to manage change is to ensure that the communication lines are kept open and efficient. Intranet systems, open-door policies and open meetings are all useful in defusing the problems that arise from change.
Communication with and from senior management is extremely important because of the way people process information. In the absence of solid information, the human brain has the facility to formulate hypotheses that will be used as a model for the universe until accurate information can be gained. In corporate terms, this means that lack of information about forthcoming changes will result in guesswork by staff, a flood of rumours and even staff actions based on the rumours and hypotheses. At this point, managerial attempts to ‘scotch’ the rumours are likely to be met with further suspicion. Figure 4.2 shows situations in which senior management needs to provide information to employees, both to allay their fears and to promote more positive attitudes to the change.
Figure 4.2 Providing information about change
Front-line staff
Front-line staff are those who have regular contact with people outside the organisation. These people have an obvious responsibility for public relations and are therefore likely to be key targets for internal marketing activities.
Typical examples of front-line staff are:
receptionists
telephonists
truck drivers
some warehouse staff
serving staff in company canteens
credit controllers
progress chasers.
This list does not include marketing professionals such as salespeople and PR officers whose main role is dealing with people outside the organisation.
Front-line staff have a particular responsibility for maintaining good relationships with the outside world. Although many organisations pay attention to the effect that their receptionists and telephonists have, relatively few pay attention to training their truck drivers in dealing with the public. In recent years it has become fashionable for organisations to have a ‘freefone’ telephone number on the backs of their trucks so that other road users are able to comment on the driver's road manners, but this does not always extend to ensuring that drivers are polite and helpful when actually making deliveries.
Aer Lingus
During late 1999, Aer Lingus ran a series of magazine advertisements in which it emphasised the friendliness of its staff. Much was said in the advertising about the warm welcome that Irish people traditionally give to strangers, but the most telling point was the headline: ‘We don't spend money teaching people to smile at our customers. We just hire nice people to begin with.’
The Aer Lingus example makes a nice story, but in fact life is not that simple. Even nice people have a bad day sometimes or do not know what power they have to make redress in the event of a problem with a customer, and most nice people still need to be trained in dealing with customer complaints or abuse. This is part of the role of internal marketing.
Southwest Airlines
Southwest Airlines has an unusual approach to its customers. For one thing, the company encourages staff to have fun while working – a playful approach to the job is encouraged, and staff will joke with passengers and even play practical jokes on occasion. Also, Southwest takes the attitude that staff morale is essential to good customer relations – unlike most organisations, the airline takes pride in saying that staff morale comes ahead of customer service. As a result, the company claims that customer service is actually improved – because staff are better motivated and happier, they present a more positive face to the customers.
Embedded within the corporate culture is the notion that business effectiveness depends upon the ability to build strong and caring relationships between staff members. Regardless of position or title, employees are expected to be available to one another, and the company operates a culture committee to ensure that this happens. One culture committee member shared some interesting comments from a senior manager:
‘While I was out in the field visiting one of our stations, one of the managers mentioned to me that he wanted to put up a suggestion box. And I responded to him by saying, “Sure, why don't you put up a suggestion box right here on the wall and admit you are a failure as a manager?” Our theory at Southwest is, if you have to put up a box so people can write down their ideas and toss them in, then it means you are not doing what you are supposed to do. You are supposed to be setting your people up to be winners. To do that you should be listening to them and available to them in person, not via a suggestion box. And, for the most part, 1 think that most people employed here know that they can call any one of our vice-presidents on the telephone and get heard, almost immediately. We need to spend at least a third of our time out of the office, walking around. When I do go out in the field, I am much more likely to find that some of the decisions I've made are stupid decisions, and I've seen how my decisions have terribly affected and inconvenienced some of our people. And they definitely pay you with some kind of currency, and if you are incapable of changing things or fixing things or simply doing a self-audit, if you consistently try to sell your employees something they don't want, then what your employees are going to do is fire you! And the problem is, some managers have been fired and don't even know it! But their people won't do business with them any more. They go around them, they're not as committed, and they don't have as much energy. When that happens, our culture is in trouble.’
This approach to communications within the company sounds like a recipe for disaster. The managers are apparently going to be spending a great deal of their time listening to complaints from employees and even more time in trying to elicit comment from the staff. In practice, this does not happen – staff feel empowered, and (for the most part) respect the managers’ time and do not waste it. Equally, managers try not to waste employees’ time, and go to some trouble to ensure that staff are given sufficient leeway to be able to operate effectively.
Managing change
Objective
Use this activity to understand change management in your organisation. The objective is to assess the effectiveness of change management and to identify flaws in the approach. In turn, this should help you learn some lessons for the future and to consider ways in which change management could be handled more effectively.
Task
Consider a recent major change in your organisation. Use the matrix provided to analyse the way the change was handled. Tick the boxes to indicate what you believe was the case – if you like, you could get a friend or colleague to discuss the questions with you as you complete the task to confirm your own impressions of the change management process.
|
To a large extent |
To an extent |
Not much |
Not at all |
Was the change flagged up to staff in advance? |
□ |
□ |
□ |
□ |
Was discussion of the change carried out in a formal way? |
□ |
□ |
□ |
□ |
Did negative rumours about the change circulate among staff? |
□ |
□ |
□ |
□ |
Did positive rumours about the change circulate among staff? |
□ |
□ |
□ |
□ |
Did management take action concerning the rumours? |
□ |
□ |
□ |
□ |
Did any staff lose out as a result of the change? |
□ |
□ |
□ |
□ |
Did any staff gain noticeably as a result of the change? |
□ |
□ |
□ |
□ |
Were staff who lost out recompensed in some way? |
□ |
□ |
□ |
□ |
Was it clear that staff who gained by the change deserved to do so? |
□ |
□ |
□ |
□ |
Did management gain or lose in credibility as a result of the way the change was handled? |
□ |
□ |
□ |
□ |
Feedback
You should be able to identify a relationship between the way the change was handled and the effects on the credibility of managers. You should also be able to discern a relationship between the amount of information given by management and the level of rumour which resulted – the less the change was flagged up to staff in advance, the greater the degree of rumourmongering (especially negative rumours).
Whenever there is change, there will be gainers and losers. The greater the degree to which these gains and losses are seen to be fair, the better the effect on management credibility (and, of course, on staff morale).
Recap
Consider why it is important to manage the internal image
Employee attitudes have a considerable impact on the success of the organisation: firstly, in terms of their motivation to do their job and, secondly, as ambassadors for the organisation.
Employers need to encourage their employees to feel proud of their organisation and its work. Employees need to be able to answer questions about how the organisation is doing, where their contribution fits and why it matters.
Explore techniques for managing the internal image
Part of the remit for answering the above questions lies with the internal PR team, who use a mix of PR tools including corporate intranets, staff magazines, internal newsletters and staff meetings to communicate.
Managing the internal image extends beyond communication. Employers need to manage the exchange process with their staff. Important exchanges are:
– time for salary
– loyalty for supportive management
– effort for respect
– commitment and ideas for information about the organisation's future direction.
Assess the effectiveness of the house journal in your organisation
House journals are a popular means of disseminating information, but they actually do more than this. A well-designed house journal also helps to strengthen the corporate culture and promotes loyalty by marketing key messages and recognising achievement.
Readership, quality, frequency of publication, editorial policy, title, the print process, style and format are all important considerations for a house journal.
Consider how internal marketing can be used to support the change process in organisations
Managing change is a major preoccupation in organisations. An effective flow of information between senior management and employees is critical to prevent staff acting on rumour and hypotheses.
Internal marketing has an important role to play in keeping the communication lines open. Intranets, open-door policies and open meetings are all useful techniques.
More @
Quirke, B. (2002) Making the Connections: Using Internal Communication to Turn Strategy into Action, Gower Publishing
This book looks at what a business needs from its people to succeed, what gets in the way, and the role of communication in helping to bridge the gap.
Holtz, S. (2003) Corporate Conversations: A Guide to Crafting Effective and Appropriate Internal Communications, Amacom
This book aims to help companies improve their communication skills and align business correspondence with the corporate message.
The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development publishes employee communication survey information and best practice guides on its website at www.cipd.co.uk/subjects/empreltns/empcomm. Some areas require subscription but there are many excellent free resources.
Larkin, T. and Larkin, S. (1993) Communicating Change: Winning Employee Support for New Business Goals, McGraw-Hill
This book offers specific prescriptions for effecting successful change, centred around three guiding principles: conveying the message through supervisors; communicating face to face; and making the changes relevant to each work area.